Cart 
This narrow, three-level Victorian terrace in Paddington was in good shape, thanks to a renovation completed more than 15 years ago. But while the bones were sound, the finishes and fittings didn’t reflect the taste of its current owners. Nor was it practical for everyday use.
The entry wore too many hats: storage, study, and display, while the flat-pack gallery kitchen had an awkwardly placed cooktop and rangehood in the island, which blocked sightlines and limited conversation flow. Not to mention the cramped upstairs dressing room, and lack of storage in the en suite.
‘There was plenty worth keeping, starting with the original blackbutt floors, the iron lace on the facade and a fireplace in the front room that had been boarded up for years,’ says Convict Interiors founder and creative director Sam Eggleton.
Sam’s approach for the renovation started by looking closely at the owners’ lifestyles. Both owners work from home, enjoy cooking daily, entertain friends fortnightly, and travel most weekends.
‘The front room had a long job description: office; mudroom for dog leads, hiking packs and snorkelling gear; and somewhere to greet people,’ Sam explains.
‘Everything we changed traces back to how they live… The whole house had to be easy to clean and easy to lock up before a trip.’
He elevated the abode to suit these needs, removing the entry partition to create a second living area with a hero fireplace, adding custom storage to the office, and installing automatic blinds in the bedroom.
For the owners, the kitchen is very much the heart of the home. Reworking the layout into an L-shape shifted the cooking zone off the island bench, while a new marble benchtop provided a practical, hard-working surface for everyday meals and cooking.
‘They call their taste functional modernism, with a Japanese and Scandinavian lean… They love primary colours too, as long as each one lands in the right place,’ explains Sam.
‘We took that as a set of rules. Every piece had to earn its place, and materials had to be natural, in medium to light tones.’
Across the home’s three levels, each space has its own role. The ground floor brings together cooking, dining and living, the upper level is home to the primary suite, and the loft provides a dedicated workspace.
‘The house now runs around their week, with a place for each of them to work and a kitchen built for daily cooking,’ he says.
‘The dining zone has already hosted 17 people for dinner without a pinch point.’
In line with their love of travelling, the owners were overseas for most of the build, and came home to a finished, clean house with all furniture installed and a custom-made scent in the air.
‘What I’m proudest of is the handover… All they had to do was unpack,’ says Sam.
